


our hearts will beat in time

by eleadore



Series: no looking back now [1]
Category: One Direction (Band)
Genre: M/M, Non AU, Romance, Schmoop, The X Factor Era
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-12-26
Updated: 2014-12-26
Packaged: 2018-03-03 17:33:13
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,960
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2859155
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/eleadore/pseuds/eleadore
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>They’re a touchy lot, prone to wrestling and cuddling both, and he and Harry have been attached at the hip since the day they met. Louis might get a bit carried away, sometimes, but that’s only because Harry makes it so easy for him.</p>
            </blockquote>





	our hearts will beat in time

**Author's Note:**

> for the prompt: first kiss

“Well maybe this would work if Louis stopped _flirting_ and paid attention!”

Everyone quiets. The look on Liam’s face says he hadn’t meant to shout that.

It’s eight in the morning and there’s only a few people left in the studio. Most of the film crew wandered off after they got their footage and Savan stepped out for what he said was a coffee break but Louis suspects is purely an escape from their hideous rendition of _Viva La Vida,_ but it still feels a bit like being zapped onto the stage, as though there’s hundreds of eyes on him all of a sudden. And not in the good way.

Louis draws his hand away from Harry’s mouth. His fingers are wet with spit, but he can’t think of a way to wipe them off without drawing more attention to the fact that he’s been trying to—covertly, and then not-so-covertly—extract a piece of gum from Harry’s mouth for the better part of an hour, so he lets them hang by his sides, drying slowly. His face has gone unexpectedly hot, but it never turns red the way Liam’s does, which is a small blessing.

“Aw, _Liam,_ ” he says, pitching his voice high enough to make Liam twitch. “Are you feeling left out? Is that it? Don’t worry, there’s plenty of love to go around.”

There’s a snort from an assistant hovering near the back.

“I’ll flirt with you, Liam,” Zayn offers from where he’s sat on the floor, always loyal, and shares a smirk with Louis when Liam begins to sputter.

“No, I just meant—” Liam starts, but Louis already has his face gripped in both hands, squeezing it until he fish-mouths. “I just—Louis—”

“What’s that?” Louis says, cocking his head as if to hear him better, and affects Brian’s exasperated American accent. “Stop mumbling, Liam. _Enunciate._ ”

“I just meant if you would concentrate,” Liam says, after he’s managed to shove Louis off, but by then no one can hear him over the sound of Niall’s laughter, so he snaps his mouth shut and takes a seat at the piano, flustered.

Everyone goes back to what they were doing, which was a whole lot of nothing. Louis can hear Harry straightening up behind him, shaking out his hair with a little huff. No one’s watching them, and even if they were it’s not like anyone really cares what he and Harry get up to, but Louis feels too prickly and unbalanced to face him again. For as short a while as they’ve known each other, Harry’s unfairly skilled at reading him, and Louis doesn’t know what’s written on his face. So he stalks forward and grabs the first sheet of music he sees instead, bringing it up to his face for intent study.

His fingers smell like spearmint. Louis’ stomach swoops unpleasantly.

He doesn’t allow himself to consider the possibility of Liam having a point. They’re a touchy lot, prone to wrestling and cuddling both, and he and Harry have been attached at the hip since the day they met. Louis might get a bit carried away, sometimes, but that’s only because Harry makes it so easy for him.

If Liam doesn’t like it, he can just leave the band.

Louis is squaring his shoulders, readying for more mischief, when something warm and wet and shaped distinctly like a wad of gum is tucked behind his ear. He turns to find Harry rocking on his heels with his hands clasped behind his back, smiling his sweetest smile.

“You’re vile,” Louis informs him, and ignores the way his insides flutter.

If he makes a show of peeling the gum off only to then slip it in his pocket, that’s his business.

* * *

Liam corners him while they wait for a car to take them back to the house.

The other three are fielding the gaggle of girls who trailed them to the studio that morning, taking pictures and signing things and chattering away. Harry’s chewing a new piece of gum, popping it in the girls’ faces to make them giggle. When he’d done the same to Mary, last night, she asked if he wasn’t keeping his breath minty fresh in hopes of getting a kiss. She had to beat him off with a hairbrush after Harry took that as invitation, but that episode ended with her grudgingly planting a smooch on the crown of his curly head. The girls gathered around him now look anything but grudging.

Louis doesn’t care, or anything. But Harry’s mouth hardly needs the help when it comes to being unfairly distracting, and he definitely doesn’t need the encouragement or a bigger audience, so Louis shares an eye-roll with Zayn and wanders off. He isn’t feeling out of sorts, exactly, but like he could stand to not be the center of attention for a little while, so he’s loitering around the back of the building by himself when Liam approaches.

He looks anxious, because he’s an idiot who worries over the stupidest things long after normal people have forgotten them.

“Look, er,” he starts. “Louis. You know I didn’t mean it like that. Don’t you? I just meant, we’re in the finals now, so you have to be serious. Because it’s serious. I didn’t mean you were, like. You know. Obviously.”

“No,” Louis says pleasantly. “I have no idea what you’re trying to say to me,” and doesn’t even feel bad when Liam’s face falls, because it’s his own fault he’s so gullible.

The car arrives before Liam can try again, and Louis is shepherded in along with the rest. Harry’s the last to climb in, because he always has a hard time shaking off the fans—that they even have fans still makes Louis boggle, much less loyal, if slightly obsessive ones—and that leaves him sat on the other side of Niall, who’s squished between the two of them. Louis doesn’t mind, because Niall is every bit as comfortable as Harry. So comfortable, in fact, that Louis just has to drape an arm over his shoulders and tug him in. And if his hand so happens to knock into Harry, well.

Harry hooks their fingers together like he was waiting for it. When Louis dares to glance at him, he’s smiling, and his eyes are closed.

* * *

Dinner at the X-Factor house is always a loud, messy affair. These happen to be two of Louis’ favourite qualities, but he isn’t hungry tonight. His stomach feels a bit like it’s turned inside out and begun to consume itself, and the tips of his fingers are tingling, like something’s about to happen, though nothing does. He’s tempted to take an early shower and wash off the jitters, but the thought of leaving Harry is even less appealing, so he stays, and amuses himself by trying to flick Harry’s nose right as he’s about to take a bite.

He gets in twice before Harry grabs his wrist. His hand is big enough to wrap all the way around, dry and warm. Louis’ heart starts rabbiting just like that, fool thing, so Louis drives all of his weight behind flicking him one last time.

His finger ends up in Harry’s mouth instead, held carefully between his teeth. Someone laughs at something. Louis can’t tear his eyes away from Harry’s as he bites down, just hard enough to hurt. Then his eyes flutter, and he seals his mouth around Louis’ finger in a sweet, sharp suck, tongue shockingly wet against Louis’ skin.

It’s just a second. Louis knows that. His finger slips out of Harry’s mouth, someone jostles Louis from behind, there’s a shout as food gets in someone’s hair. It’s just a second, but Louis can feel his heartbeat in the tip of that finger, pounding suddenly in his temples and belly and cock. He’s chubbed right up in his trackies, so fast it’s left him dizzy.

Harry drops his hand and dimples.

“Ow,” Louis says.

* * *

He’s only been out on the balcony for five minutes when Harry finds him. There’s still a great deal of noise coming from inside the house, but the kitchen is dark and silent and the only light out here is from the lamps winding along with the trail.

Harry knocks their shoulders together. “Hi.”

“Harold,” Louis greets politely, and Harry nudges him again, stepping on Louis’ toes as he tries to shift closer. It’s not so chilly, but his breath still fogs up the night air, and for a second it feels like they’re back in the bungalow, trying to catch each other’s eyes in the dark.

“Lewis. Why’d you leave?”

Because while Louis had been holding court and kicking arse on the Wii, Harry lay sprawled over Matt’s lap, playing with Cher’s toe ring, and hadn’t looked over at him, not even when he’d won, not even once. It seems stupid now, as though Louis had thrown a strop over not having all of Harry’s attention always, but at the time it felt a little like no one had thought to tell Louis the world ended.

Louis is not a child. He doesn’t know why Harry makes him feel like one, needy and mercurial and like he’s only just figured out what it’s like to fancy someone.

He doesn’t know how to say all of that, so he shrugs. Harry’s warm and Louis wants to touch him. In the span of this moment it feels like he’s never wanted anything more, so he grabs Harry’s hand and holds it, for a beat, before his face gets too hot and his chest too tight.

Then he grips Harry’s wrist and slaps him with his own hand. “Stop hitting yourself. Harry! Stop hitting yourself!”

Harry laughs so hard at Louis’ outraged voice that Louis can’t keep a straight face, and they dissolve into a slap-fight that ends with Louis pinned against the railing, winding up a punch to land gently on Harry’s jaw.

“Oof,” Harry says, throwing his head back in slow motion, and then pops his gum right in Louis’ face.

His lips look so soft. He gets them slick as he draws the gum back into his mouth, teeth digging in slow. Louis should stop staring.

He leans in. Harry leans away.

Then he fishes the gum out of his mouth and sticks to the railing.

“Choking hazard,” he says, cheeky, tongue caught between his teeth, like he hadn’t just broken a little bit of Louis’ heart. But he must see it on Louis’ face, because the smile falls from his and he says, “oh, Lou,” before kissing him.

Louis tells himself it’s just like any other kiss he’s had, but the first shaky brush of their mouths makes him tremble, and his heart swells up so big it clogs his throat. There’s a hand cupping his jaw, then the back of his neck, and his own hands are fisted in Harry’s shirt, but he can’t make any sense of it. There’s just the sweet swipe of Harry’s tongue against his and the heat radiating from every point they touch. He tastes like spearmint.

“Bastard,” Louis says, in the hot, shaky space between kisses, and Harry makes an unhappy noise, rubbing their noses together.

“Thought you were teasing,” he says. “How could you think I’d ever say no?”

He sounds offended, so Louis kisses him again, deeper this time, until they’re entirely out of breath. Harry’s hands find his and clutch at him.

“You don’t need an excuse to touch me,” he whispers. “I want you to. All the time.”

There’s a crash from inside the house, silence, then shouting. Harry’s so still he’s barely breathing, waiting, so Louis threads their fingers together. Squeezes.

“Yeah,” he says, and it’s a promise.

**Author's Note:**

> originally posted on [tumblr](http://eleadored.tumblr.com/post/99067796396/could-you-do-x-factor-first-kiss-or-x-factor). thanks for reading.


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